Rod Sims' crusade to ensure that a renewed state government enthusiasm for privatisation does not translate into a "tax on future generations of Australian" has been ratcheted up with the Australian competition regulator's forceful submission to a Victorian parliamentary review of the sale of Melbourne's container port.

The chairman of the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission has been increasingly vocal in his criticism of the misplaced government ambitions that continue to shape the sale processes of state-owned infrastructure assets.